Nationally and internationally the film Brokeback Mountain gained praise as one of the rare Hollywood films which treated a gay relationship seriously.
In the UK, 2 of the contenders for the leadership of the Lib Dems were outed. Simon Hughes (not exactly a surprise) and Mark Oaten (who?).
LGBT History Month was inaugurated in the UK in February 2005. In 2006 several local events were organised including:
1. A talk by Robert Thompson of the Lesbian and Gay media Archive about media stereotyping
2. An LGBT History pub quiz night
3. A "Famous LGBT Faces" bingo night
4. A presentation and display on LGBT history at Age Concern (see below)
5. Displays of LGBT History at the Council House, Police HQ (Sherwood Lodge) and at the "Real Lives, Real People" Conference in Worksop. At each of these Switchboard's Powerpoint presentation of 400 famous LGBT people kept looping round for hours on end to hypnotic effect. The nature of "fame" meant that many of the people were from Show Biz or the Arts, but there were also lots of Kings and Queens, several cartoon characters, a couple of gangsters, a serial killer, a saint, a victim of queerbashers, a nazi, several clergymen, an imam and a pope.
On April 6th an audience at the Beth Shalom Holocaust Centre in Laxton heard Janni Kowalski talk about his life during World War II. We heard how a head injury, caused by being trapped under a collapsed building, completely wiped out his memory and how he was rescued by a Jewish family which then became his own family.
His story moved on to harrowing experiences in the Warsaw ghetto and later in the concentration camps of Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen. While at that time being gay led to many people being persecuted and killed, Janni frankly admits that he survived because he was gay and became the lover of a senior German officer. Janni's story is told in his book "Liebe Macht Frei".
On May 18th 2006, Notts Switchboard received a letter from the Charity Commission stating that Switchboard had now become a registered charity.
Nottingham Pride, on July 29th, was bigger and better than ever. Over 10,000 people passed through the gates of the Arboretum. Some of the more unusual visions are shown below
There were several stalls from organisations such as the City Council, County Register Offices, Trades Unions, the Co-op.
We also snapped members of the Police and East Mercia MSC, but can you tell which is which?
2007
LGBT History month seemed to be becoming more well-established. A look at the national LGBT History Month website shows all sorts of things happening all over the UK, but apart from London, the areas where most is going on seem to be Nottingham and Stockport.
February opened with a week long display at County Hall which was staffed by people from different organisations/interests each day.
Another display was set up by Switchboard for 2 weeks in Central Library.
Other events included: a gay history walk; a season of 3 LGBT films at Broadway cinema; an LGBT History Pub Quiz; a talk by Sarah Waters at Waterstones; a lecture on Alfred Kinsey at Nottingham University; displays and happenings at Castle College; displays at various sites in North Notts put together by the North Notts LGB Development group and Switchboard.
While most areas of LGB life have shown progress over the past few years, schools are often depressing areas where homophobia is rife. Nottingham City Council, with help particularly from Children's Services and OutBurst LGBT Youth Group, put together a pack providing information about tackling homophobia in schools. The pack has been sent to every school, college and youth group in the City.
Despite a few small scale protests outside the House of Lords and an advertising campaign of the most blatant lies by a right-wing Christian group, the Goods and Services Act passed unaltered through both Houses of Parliament and became law on April 30th. The Catholic Church's agencies have been given until the end of 2008 to work out how they are going to accommodate themselves to the law.
In Notts, the Newark Advertiser has always refused ads for any LGB organisation. We hoped that they might be a test case for the new law, but an application on May 2nd to place an ad. for Nottingham Switchboard was accepted without any fuss. The law is working!
The 2007 Nottingham Pride at the Arboretum was held on practically the only good day for weather in July. Luck is with the Pride Committee who also deserve praise for splendid organisation of what is a free, fun day - and a family day too. About 12,000 turned up.
A poster-type version of Switchboard' Famous LGBT Faces was on display
After 13 years and never ending questions about "why is it GAi?" the GAi project renamed itself Healthy Gay Nottingham.
The success of the events for LGBT HIstory Month prompted a group of people to put together a grant application to fund a large scale local LGBT HIstory project. The application was sent to the Heritage Lottery Fund on October 1st and on December 13th a telephone called confirmed that the group had been awarded £40,600.
2008
In January, the LGBT History Project (named Nottinghamshire's Rainbow Heritage) was preoccupied with organising events for 2008's LGBT HIstory Month. They also managed quickly to find an office space (you can find their contact details in the "QB Listings section") and produce a logo.
Local LGBT History Month events included:
An LGBT History quiz at the Lord Roberts
A presentation on Nottingham CHE in the 1970s
Displays at Central Library, the Council House and Sherwood Lodge Police HQ
Several events at Nottingham Trent University
A six-day LGBT exhibition at View from the Top
The OutHouse saga was brought to a close on May 1st at the New Foresters. A party was given to celebrate the dissolution of the project and the handing over of their financial assets to the two local charities whose aims most closely coincided with those of OutHouse - namely Nottingham Switchboard and Nottingham Pride. A cheque for £40,000 was handed over to Nottingham Switchboard - below
and a further cheque for £15,000 was handed to Nottingham Pride - below
